What’s it like to have a 100 year lifetime? Let’s ask my friend Milt!

As I tried to make my way into Milt’s home, crammed with well-wishers and partiers, it was hard to imagine being surrounded by so many people, some there in person and some in spirit, making up a 100-year lifetime.

Imagine living for 100 years. The experiences you’d have. Births and deaths, changes in our world, growth of family and friends, changes in your own world, and so much more.

My old friend (and in this case that’s an apropos descriptor!), Milt, turned 100 last week, and I was honored to be at the celebration. We met through his wife, Jo, many years ago. She was the president of the California Association of Marriage & Family Therapists when I was its chief executive. And to know Jo, you had to know Milt, too. She left us a couple years ago, when we all thought Milt would be the one. And yet there he stood with that cherub-like grin of his, laughing among friends and family as would a new-born experiencing his first smile.

When asked what were the most significant changes he’d experienced in his century of life, he was quick to note two things: transportation and communication. He pointed out the obvious – commercial air travel, roads and highways for motored vehicles, the ways we get around now and the range of alternatives.

And communication. It goes without saying, even writing this piece that becomes available to not only you, the reader who subscribes here, but to millions of others throughout the world who can access it through a range of their own personal devices. Instantly. Just imagine by contrast Milt’s world in 1913.

That’s not what was at the heart of Milt’s insights and revelation, though. He talked, too, about the value of people and how it’s changed over time. He quipped that he asked someone recently what they were getting paid, and about the minimum wage being about $7 or $8 per hour. When he grew up, he was paid two dollars. Per day.

But his point was very much a metaphor. He wistfully talked about whether we value people in our lives, in our workplaces and just in general in the world. Do we make the time for them? Do they mean as much as time goes by?

Milt has learned a lot during his 100 years of life. Especially about how to care for and about people. Friends. Family. Co-workers. And expects more to come. That was obvious from the full house and the line of folks gathered outside who couldn’t make it in.

What about us? What has our lifetime meant? Where we work? Among family? And friends? And those whose lives we touch even casually?

My friend and I stood listening to Milt, and contemplated what the next 30 or 40 years of our lives would witness, were we lucky enough to have them. Changes in technology. Communication. And so many other aspects of our lives. And it reminded us of the value of our own multiple-decades relationship, and the changes we’ve experienced, with more to come.

As another year comes to an end, and a dear friend like Milt reminds us of what a lifetime really means, what about you? What has been important during your lifetime? And what do you imagine the next 10, 20, 30 years or more will bring? Not just to our world, collectively. To your own special world you get to create every day.